Sebastian Vettel battling to banish the demons of last year's German GP horror show and reignite F1 career

Vettel's season effectively ended on home turf this time last year.
Getty Images

If Sebastian Vettel needed to recall how and why his stock has fallen in Formula One then his home grand prix might act as an unwanted reminder this weekend.

This time a year ago, he arrived at Hockenheim leading the championship and fresh from having gained the psychological advantage of beating Lewis Hamilton at his own home race at Silverstone the preceding grand prix weekend.

When Hamilton failed to get through the second qualifying session, it felt like Vettel, then with the fastest car on the grid, was at the turning point of his season, and so it proved although not in the manner that the four-time world champion would have envisaged.

Comfortably leading the race and with just 15 laps remaining, he came into turn 12 in the rain, locked up his wheels and his race ended in the Armco barrier.

To make matters worse, Hamilton scythed his way through the field from 14th into the unlikeliest of victories to take a championship lead he never again conceded.

Whether that was the moment the psychological demons kicked in for Vettel, he has never been quite the same driver since. His first Formula One team boss, Gerhard Berger described it as “a hangover” that the German was incapable of shaking however hard he tried.

But Berger readily admitted he was left scratching his head to explain his personal downward spiral. “Sometimes it’s inexplicable,” he said.

“There are duels, you find rhythm but it goes wrong the first time overtaking. But then it works well 10 times. It looks funny from the outside and cannot be explained but that’s just how it is.”

In Pictures: British Grand Prix 2019 | 14/07/2019

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Right now, Vettel cannot buy a successful drive. At the preceding race two weekends ago at Silverstone he again failed to make it to the chequered flag after driving into the back of Max Verstappen and then performed a very public mea culpa in the aftermath.

But those two driving howlers almost a year apart are just the bookends to the most difficult passage of a career which, for now at least, appears to have stalled.

Last year there was wheel contact and a spin at the Italian Grand Prix, another spin in battling with Verstappen at the Japanese Grand Prix and then yet another off-track misdemeanour when tussling for position with Daniel Ricciardo in the United States.

This season there was the spin in Bahrain followed by the race win that never was in Canada, where Vettel was denied victory following a five-second penalty imposed for dangerous driving towards Hamilton.

AFP/Getty Images

The most recent mishap at Silverstone has led to conjecture the 32-year-old might be on the cusp of calling time on his F1 career, although yesterday he even joked he could drive up to his 40th birthday.

This season has begged the question is the driver past his peak having not picked up a race win for nearly a year?

Hamilton has tipped him to return: “I absolutely believe he’ll rebound. He’s a four-time world champion, he will recover, that’s what great athletes do.”

In his defence, Vettel looked relatively at ease at yesterday’s FIA press conference, laughing and joking with Kimi Raikkonen but he knows he cannot afford another on-track mishap.

If he finds the expectation and driving for Ferrari a burden, he wasn’t admitting to it. “It doesn’t feel like a burden, it feels like a privilege to race for Ferrari.

“My mission and goal and team’s goal is to get back to the winning ways. If we do that then we have a much better chance to fight for the championship.

“From when I joined to where we are now, this year hasn’t gone well compared to that last two years but things are progressing in the bigger picture. Formula 1 is a world where people are short sighted… but overall things look good.”

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